


jerusalem bells

by theformerone



Category: K (Anime)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Everybody Lives, Fix-It, Gen, M/M, Red Clan Family Feels, i finished k and now my heart is BROKEN
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-28
Updated: 2018-02-28
Packaged: 2019-03-24 19:47:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,411
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13818204
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theformerone/pseuds/theformerone
Summary: A king is something forged, but a man is something born. And sometimes, men are born again.Kino Makoto has a body temperature so low he should be dead.





	jerusalem bells

**Author's Note:**

> title lifted from 'Viva la Vida' by Coldplay

They say the heart speaks in whispers. 

He pours his heart into Reisi's ear, and then he falls.

* * *

On the other side is a man with golden hair and golden eyes and a smile that drags his breath out of his chest. 

"Hey, you," he says. 

And he knows the man's name like he knows the black scars on his hand, like he knows the cuff in his ear, like he knows the name of every person he welcomed into the folds of the clan of fire. 

But he doesn't. 

"It's okay," the man says, not even looking sad. He only looks hopeful. "It'll take some time for everything to come back. Just be patient."

He knows who he is, but he doesn't. He knows he is a patient man. He knows he has a mass of family, many of them his children, and a slim handful of them his brothers. The man in front of him is something else. 

"I'm always patient," is what he replies. 

The blond man laughs at that and stuffs his hands in his pockets. 

"Yeah," he says. "You always were. I was, too."

Something in the blond man's face gets pinched. He looks at him, not through him, not through him from top to bottom, assessing. And then there are tears in the blond man's eyes. 

"I missed you," he says, breathless with the honesty, with the longing in the three words. 

"I missed you, too."

He doesn't even have to stop himself from saying it. It bursts from his lips because this is a place not built for falseness. It is a truth, one of the few truths he's recognized in the time since this man (one of his clansmen, but not quite, something different, something  _more_ ) left him and the others to silence. He had been music when he lived. And food and film and laughter. He had been their cornerstone.

"I had hoped I wouldn't see you so soon," the blond man says.

He scoffs. 

"That's not very nice," he replies. 

The blond man's smile is sad. He steps forward, bare feet crossing the little distance between them. He places his hands on his shoulders, then pulls him in for a hug. He's soft, and his skin is cool. He smells like nothing. It's strange. 

"I knew you would do it," the blond man murmurs, "but part of me hoped that you wouldn't."

He tenses in the blond man's arms. 

"I had to."

"No," the blond man says, "you didn't. And it's okay."

The blond man pulls back and looks him over. He places one hand against his cheek, and he can't help but lean into the touch. 

"You were manipulated," the blonde man says, rubbing his cheekbone with his thumb, "we all were."

The blond man smiles at him again, and it's less sad. Now, it's an indescribably fond look. One full of years of affection. It makes his heart clench in his chest. He turns his face to kiss at the hand that rubs his cheek. The blond man chuckles and allows it.

"I shouldn't have expected any less," the blond man says. "I always knew you would be a King that would die for his people. I had only hoped you would never have to be."

A King. It's - familiar, but far away. Something he knows, but can't place.

He doesn't have long to think about it. The blond man draws him into an embrace, and his body goes from cool to hot. He fidgets instinctively, knowing that the heat is too much to be comfortable, but something like a memory buried in the back of his mind tells him that he is safe. That heat is not something that can harm him. 

That he has a heart made of fire. 

"You get to go back," the blond man says into his ear. "And I can't follow you there."

He stiffens in the blond man's embrace, but the blond man doesn't let him go. In fact, he holds on even tighter. 

"Red is the color of fire and destruction, but also of blood, of life, and of love," the bond man says. "It can destroy the people who wield it, but it can also protect them."

This world they're in is fading. It's growing too bright and too dark, and he can't keep his eyes open. It's decided he doesn't belong there anymore. He wants to argue. Wants to fight against it. This man belongs at his side, back home with the rest of them. He will not leave if he cannot take the blond man with him. 

"You're so stubborn," the man says, chuckling. 

He squeezes him tight before pulling out of the embrace. 

When the man presses their lips together in a kiss that tastes like air and grief and something that _was,_ he hears his voice in his mind. 

 _'Come back in your own time. This is the only second chance you get. Don't waste it.'_  

* * *

There's a scrawny looking kid standing outside of HOMRA. It's raining, and through the window, Izumo can tell he's shivering. He narrows his eyes through his glasses while he wipes down the bar and wonders if the kid will ever step inside. 

About two minutes later he does. He's sopping wet. He's got a beanie pulled down over his ears, and he's dressed in a thin hoodie and torn black jeans. He's shaking visibly with the cold. Izumo narrows his eyes; the kid's nose is bright red with cold. 

His face is a little pinched, a little narrow. Even through his wet clothes, Izumo can tell he's underfed. A stray. They used to take in a lot of those in HOMRA. They still do. But if this kid is looking to join the clan, he's way too small and too sick looking to even breathe near Anna, much less take on the red aura. 

"Hey, kid," he begins. "You look like you need to go to a hospital or someth-"

"Irish coffee."

Izumo lifts a single eyebrow. The kid takes a seat at the bar like he owns the place. Izumo's seen a lot of kids come through HOMRA, some of them worthy, some of them not. Some of them hungry for power, others just desperate to find a place where someone will look after them. 

This kid looks like neither of those. 

"How about just a regular coffee," he replies. "You look like a drop of liquor would knock you off your feet."

The kid says nothing, so Izumo hangs up the rag he's been using to wipe down the counter and goes about making the kid his coffee. 

"You got a name?" he asks, prepping a saucer for the cup. 

"Kino Makoto."

Izumo snorts. Ever since Anna came into the fold, a certain person had led a concerted effort to socialize her like a normal child of her age. Part of that had been binge watching Sailor Moon, filler and all. Anna had predictably, only paid attention when Sailor Mars was on screen while everyone else had gotten into unreasonably heated debates about whether or not Sailor Moon counted as a King.

"Okay, Sailor Jupiter, don't tell me," Izumo says. "Any reason you're at a bar on a school night?"

The kid, Makoto, shrugs. 

"It looked warm inside," he replies. 

Izumo hums, and brings out the sugar he uses to rim margarita glasses, and the cream he uses for actual Irish coffees. 

"You got parents?" he asks, sliding the cup of hot coffee on its saucer towards the kid. He follows it up with the cream and sugar. 

Makoto shakes his head and pours a ridiculous amount of sugar into his coffee. He tops it up with what amounts to a single drop of cream. 

"You got anywhere to stay for the night?" 

He shakes his head again. Makoto places his hands around his mug to warm them. Izumo sees that his fingers are clearly frostbitten. 

It was a bitterly cold April, and no kid in their right mind should have been walking around in such thin clothes with only a hat for protection. It had been raining for weeks; it was a miracle this kid hadn't gotten hypothermia and died on the street. 

The bar is HOMRA headquarters, but it's also legally Izumo's, and he can do what he wants with the sofa in the upstairs apartment. It wouldn't be the first time some scrawny kid in a beanie showed up at HOMRA only to stay forever. It probably wouldn't be the last.

"Have you eaten?" Izumo asks. 

The kid shakes his head again, and Izumo starts running through his head what to do for people with hypothermia. They needed to be heated up slowly, with lots of blankets. The kid could probably handle a hot bath or a shower in the morning. But for tonight, the mass of soft fleece blankets hiding in the living room closet of the apartment upstairs would have to do. 

"Alright," Izumo says. "Stay at the bar until I close up shop. You can sleep on the couch upstairs. Sound good?"

The kid looks up at him, and his eyes are a bright amber color. A little glassy, too. He probably has a fever. Upon closer inspection, it’s obvious he’s not a kid at all. He’s hunched over on himself, but he’s easily as tall as Izumo is. He’s gotta be at least in his twenties, but he’s so skinny he looks like a soft wind could put him on his ass.

There's something vaguely familiar about him; probably one of Yata's unaffiliated friends. He makes a mental note to ask Yata about him in the morning. 

"Yeah," the kid croaks. 

Izumo cracks a little smile and watches as the kid sips at his coffee. 

"A man of few words," he says. "I like it."

* * *

He knows a couple of things for sure. Like his name is not Kino Makoto, that Kusanagi will give anyone ballsy enough to ask a job, and that Yata loves cherry cola in those old school glass bottles.

He knows that Anna is the King now, knows Kamamoto likes anmitsu and card games, and that Dewa likes spicy food and teasing Kamamoto about his weak stomach for the stuff. He knows Chitose likes clove cigarettes but that Fujishima hates the smell of them. 

He knows Akagi teases Bandō about wearing sunglasses that make him look like Kusanagi, and that Bandō only wears them so Akagi will tease him. He knows that Solt loves foreign language films, especially French ones.

He knows that Fushimi isn’t one of theirs anymore, but that the way he keeps coming back to hassle Yata tells him that Fushimi never really left.

He knows that the blond haired man is as important to these people as he is to him.

But he doesn’t know what his name is, and he doesn’t know why he’s always so cold, and he doesn’t know how he fits in this group of blood red people. 

* * *

Makoto's a pretty cool guy, even though he doesn't talk all that much. Kusanagi lets him work the bar when rush hour comes through, and that tells Yata and the others enough about the guy. Anyone Kusanagi lets behind the bar is someone that can be trusted.

The way he hangs around all the time, and is the sole occupant of the upstairs couch, Yata would think he's looking to join the clan. He's a little on the scrawny side, but so is Yata. So is everyone really, except for Kamamoto. But Makoto doesn't seem interested in the way red flares around their fists, or the way that Kusanagi can light every cigarette in the room with a snap of his fingers. 

He's more interested in carefully polishing the bar. In tidying up the downstairs couches, and wiping down the wooden shelves that are occupied with Tatara's many collected items. He dusts them tenderly, and Yata wonders if Kusanagi has told him about Tatara, and what he meant to them.

One time, Yata watches the guy prep a drink for Anna. She's kicking her legs quietly at the booth, watching as he flips the glass into the air, bounces it off his elbow. It vaults over itself, but Makoto slows it down with a casual slap of his palm, and lands the glass tidily on the bar in front of Anna, without the fine glass even chipping. 

He pours in the ice, then the sprite and the grenadine, and drops in three stemless maraschino cherries. He tops it off with a slim white bendy straw. As casual as can be, he nudges the drink towards Anna, who takes a sip. 

"Where'd you learn to do all that?" Yata asks, still a little surprised at the display.

Kusanagi doesn't usually do bartending tricks because of the off chance one of them might damage his bar. But Makoto just pulled a really complicated looking one off without hesitating. Makoto shrugs a shoulder and starts tidying up the small mess he made while making Anna's drink. 

"My brother owns a bar," Makoto answers. 

That makes Yata perk up. He didn't think Makoto had any siblings. He'd been bumming around HOMRA for a couple of weeks, always bundled up to the nose, wrapped up in hoodies and scarves and a black beanie he had pulled down so far over his head none of his hair was visible. From what Kusanagi had said, Makoto didn't have any family, didn't have anywhere to go. Which meant he ended up at HOMRA like the rest of them did; because it was the only place left for them. 

Absently, through the grief surrounding Mikoto's death and how quickly it followed Tatara's, Yata is grateful,  _so grateful_ that the Red Clan he managed to be a part of, was a place that gave people some place to come home to. 

"You have a brother?" Yata asks. 

He guesses it's a sob story. If Makoto had no parents and no home other than HOMRA, then his brother probably wasn't a safe bet either. 

Makoto nods and starts making another drink. Yata watches as he fills a highball glass with ice, then tequila and orange juice. He tops it with the same grenadine and an orange slice, then throws in a white straw, and a bright pink umbrella. He pushes the drink towards Yata. 

He takes a sip, and the tequila bites at his mouth but the grenadine and the orange juice cut most of the angry flavor. Yata turned twenty a couple of weeks ago, but he hasn't really had an appetite for alcohol. The party that the clan had thrown for him had been fun, but he ended up spending the rest of the night crouched at Mikoto's grave, sucking down a cigarette that made his lungs feel too tight. 

So this drink that Makoto's put in front of him is his first legal one, and it doesn't taste or smell like rubbing alcohol the way most of the drinks that Kusanagi's customers prefer do. When he takes a second and third sip, he finds that he likes it. It's good. 

"What's this called?" Yata asks. 

He cuts his eyes to Anna, who has already managed to suck down her entire drink and is using her straw to drudge up the cherries from the bottom of the glass. Before Yata can ask her to give her the glass so he can move them, Makoto's placed a spoon on a napkin by Anna's right hand so she can do it herself. 

"It's a tequila sunrise," Makoto answers. 

Yata can't help the grin around his straw at the name. He's drinking a sunrise! How clever. How fitting. 

"Thanks, Kino," he says. 

Makoto nods, and Yata lets himself kick his heels as he has his first drink and Anna eats her cherries from a spoon. The way the others laugh at him for getting buzzed off one drink is worth it. He hasn't felt this warm inside in a long time.

* * *

"Who is he?"

Anna purses her lips as her marbles whirl around on the table in front of her. Izumo sits opposite, and she can feel his patience and his curiosity rub against her own mind. 

"His name isn't Kino Makoto," she replies. "But I can't tell what his name is because he doesn't know it himself."

Izumo rubs at his chin. 

"An amnesiac?" 

Anna goes to shake her head, then hesitates. 

"It's more like a repressed memory," she explains. "When I try to look into his mind, he's not blocking me. The memories themselves won't let him in, and they won't let me in either."

Izumo hums at that, and Anna lets her marbles stop whirling on the table. They come to stillness, each pointing in one of the cardinal directions while they are at rest. 

"You like him," he says after a moment of silence. 

Anna looks up at Izumo, head tilted. She scratches at her ear, considering. 

She doesn't know what to make of Kino Makoto. He's not a Strain, but he's obviously not a civilian. The way he holds himself is too much like a predator, and not at all like prey. He's got wise eyes, and he's quiet the way she is quiet. But where Anna's silence comes from a cultivated self control, Kino's comes from - well, somewhere else. Somewhere that Anna can't see. 

"He's weak," she says by way of an answer. "If I tried to make him one of us, the aura would kill him."

And that was unfortunate. Because Kino reminded her very much of someone she treasures still, but Anna will not risk his life for a bond that could just as easily be made with affection instead of fire. 

"But you like him," he says. 

"So do you," Anna replies. "All of us do."

* * *

They aren't out on patrol, they're headed out for soba. Makoto has an endless appetite for a kid as small as he is, and he blows through the paychecks Kusanagi gives him for snacks and meals alone. Kamamoto isn't complaining; he likes soba, and he likes having a fresh ear to tell about the best hole-in-the-wall places in town for good food and atmosphere. Makoto was a pretty quiet guy, a good listener, and he took Kamamoto's recommendations every time he suggested something new for him to try.

It's a nice day. April came in went in a bitter cold, and most of the summer followed that way until August came. It's warmer, but it's still cool enough for a jacket. Makoto is apparently cold any time of year, everywhere he goes; he's got a denim jacket thrown on over a black hoodie, and he's wearing a pair of Kusanagi's old boots. He's wearing black scarf and that black hat of his, and his hands are stuffed into his pockets.

Yata is chattering on about the last time Kamamoto took him to this ramen place, how they had taken a group so big the waiters had to push a couple of tables together to accommodate all of them. It's a fond memory. They were a rowdy group of people to take out, but they had tipped well to make up for the noise. The edges of Makoto's mouth are quirked up in what Kamamoto knows by how is an approximation of a smile. 

It's a nice day. A nice moment. So of course Fushimi comes out of nowhere to ruin it.

He's in his blues, which means he is on patrol, and despite the fact that they aren't, Yata still has his skateboard. Fushimi has that smug ass grin on his face, the one that's basically a match to Yata's gasoline. 

"Yata," Kamamoto warns. "There are too many people around here. Not to mention Kino."

Kamamoto watches as Yata looks from the civilians on the streets around them to Makoto, who's stopped walking because the two of them did as well. He's a couple of feet away from them, which is strange. He doesn't know the way to the soba place, but he's walking forward like he does. 

There's a tense line in Yata's shoulders, but he huffs and nods. Yata is the fastest of them, without a doubt. He could get into a scrape with Fushimi even here without getting any civilians hurt. But Kino is different. He's unaffiliated, but he spends too much time at HOMRA not to somehow get caught in the crossfire of whatever shit Fushimi tries to pull. Not to mention the fact that he's the size of a toothpick; a harsh wind would knock him off his feet, much less a battle between clansmen of opposing colors.

"Yeah, alright," Yata says, still bristling. "I get it."

He shrugs off Kamamoto's hand on his shoulder and turns to keep walking. 

"You're scared, Mi-sa-ki?" Fushimi drawls as he approaches. "Have you lost your edge because your King is dead?"

It's a low blow and they all know it. It raises Kamamoto's hackles, but he knows how to hold himself back. Mikoto's been dead for months, and mourning is - complicated and messy as the clan he used to lead. Anna is a good King, but she's not a replacement for Mikoto. They all know that, and so does she. 

But Fushimi's blue robes are only a reminder of Munakata's, and Kamamoto knows that this fight will only end up being Yata projecting all of the Blues onto Fushimi and pummeling who he sees as the killer of his former King. 

"You shut your fucking mouth!" Yata shouts. 

He's just barely too slow to grab at Yata's arm to slow him down. Fushimi's laughing, drawing his sword and Yata slams his skateboard onto the ground to get a rolling start. They're rapidly approaching each other, Yata's fists covered in bright red light and his face contorted with rage and hurt. 

Kamamoto can already hear the scolding he's going to get from Kusanagi about this later. 

Then, just as Yata is preparing to pull his board up to slam it against Fushimi's raised weapon, Makoto has stepped between them. 

Kamamoto didn't even see him move. Makoto's a slow guy. He walks with a pretty languid, easy pace. The only thing he does quickly is mix drinks for customers at the bar, and he only really does tricks for Anna. Kamamoto's pretty sure he's never even seen the guy power walk, much less move fast enough to step between Yata and Fushimi in enough space to blink. 

It makes Kamamoto wonder exactly where this guy comes from. He's not clan affiliated, and they all know he isn't lying when he says it. But he moves too fast to be some plain and simple civilian. He could be a Strain, but somehow that doesn't seem quite right either.

Yata screeches to a stop just a breath away from barreling into Makoto's back, and Fushimi pulls up his sword maybe an inch away from the top of Makoto's head. The guy doesn't even look remotely phased. He looks at Fushimi and then turns his head back to look at Yata. 

"You two," Makoto says, "are bad at this."

He turns his back to Fushimi and just barely bumps his shoulder against Yata to pull him away from the guy. Yata follows, looking appropriately thunderstruck. Fushimi looks  _livid_ and Kamamoto can guess why. 

He more or less made sure that - in full view of several security cameras, cameras that SCEPTER4 undoubtedly has unfettered access to - Fushimi raised his sword to against a civilian. He was as good as fucked when that footage got back to his superiors. 

Without even touching Yata, Makoto steers him back towards Kamamoto. 

"Hey, Kino," Yata says, throwing glances back over his shoulder at Fushimi as they beat their retreat. "You shouldn't do that kind of thing, jumping between two clansmen in a fight. You could've gotten really hurt."

Makoto stuffs his hands into his pockets, and walks on. He doesn't answer Yata's scolding. 

"He wants your attention," is what he says instead. 

And that shuts Yata right up. He goes a little red in the cheeks and Kamamoto has to focus on  _not_ choking on his own tongue. The weird (and frankly, annoying) game of cat and mouse between Yata and Fushimi has lasted for as long as they've known each other. Everyone in the clan is polite enough not to make Yata feel bad about it, or really even acknowledge that it exists outside of their fight-on-sight with each other. 

"Play hard to get."

Makoto says it in that deadpan of his. But he gives Yata a jaunty wink, and then it's all over. Yata goes  _beet fucking red_ and the laugh at snaps out of Kamamoto shocks him. 

"I have no idea what you're talking about, Kino," Yata blusters. "Saru's a bastard and I'm not - like I would  _ever_ be interested in him, you're out of your mind, man. You're fuckin' crazy."

He backtracks and over explains himself all the way to the soba place. It isn't until later that Kamamoto realizes that Makoto took them the rest of the way to a restaurant he's never even been to before. 

* * *

It makes sense that the blues would bring some of the memories back. The uniform, the sword and scabbard; the color dogs him in his waking and sleeping hours, tugging at his hand and asking him to follow. There are many missing pieces to who he is, and his months sleeping above the bar have jogged most of them. There are still holes, but they are rapidly filling themselves the more time he tends the bar and takes his smoke breaks with the clan. 

But blue means something, something he can't ignore even though he's not quite sure what that something is. 

* * *

He's on his way home, headed to the train station. He's thinking of what he ought to have for dinner, and whether or not he should start a new puzzle, or if he should take an evening walk. He's crossing the street in a throng of people, careful not to jostle anyone and ducking neatly away when they are about to bump into him. 

Then he sees a pair of amber eyes and his heart takes a nosedive into his stomach. 

He stops walking, because the last time he saw those eyes, his sword was buried to the hilt in Suoh, and the weight and power of his Sword of Damocles was hanging perilously close to their heads. He stops even as the crosswalk counts down to zero, because the eyes are staring right back into his. They're confused, like they are trying to place him in a memory, but Reisi would know that face anywhere. 

He opens his mouth to say something, to say anything. But the amber eyes widen, then suddenly shut, and the mouth those eyes share a face with contorts in a grimace of agony. Hands come up to clutch at a wound that isn't there, and the stranger who is not a stranger falls to his knees in the middle of the street. 

Reisi goes to him, because the last time he let Suoh fall, he did not get back up.

* * *

Kino Makoto has a body temperature so low he should be dead.

That is the first thing Izumo learns when Awashima calls him to let him know one of his strays has ended up at the hospital. Because Makoto is the only person he actually trusts to work the bar when he's not around, Izumo closes up shop and heads out. It's the first time he's ever managed to make it to one of his clansmen before tragedy struck.

He isn't sure of when exactly he started thinking of Makoto as one of them, but from the way he's ignoring several traffic laws to burn through the city to get to the general hospital, he knows that ship has more than sailed. Makoto ate all the snacks in the bar and wore blankets around his shoulders and slept all day if he could. He nicks Izumo's cigarettes and wears fingerless gloves even in the summer. He makes Anna Shirley Temples, and he quietly mended Yata's beanie when it was ripped in a scuffle with Fushimi.

He's been with them for nearly a year, he's one of them, and Izumo isn't going to let him go without a fight.

He was too late for Tatara, he was too late for Mikoto, but he'll be damned if he's too late for Makoto, too.

* * *

He remembers the Sword falling. He remembers the Silver King offering his life for justice. He remembers placing himself in a cage and waiting for days. He remembers home. He remembers never thinking he was supposed to be a King. He remembers red being red, and then red being Red. He remembers high school, and middle school. He remembers his clansmen. He remembers a pair of glasses with a crack in the frames. He remembers a cigarette and snow, and another man's breath on his mouth, another man's fist at his collar. He remembers blue, and a sword in his chest, and pouring his heart into the ear of his killer.

He remembers Tatara. 

He remembers his name. 

* * *

The corrosive power of the Red King's aura had burned his body until there was nothing left. That was the official story, or at least what they all had been able to believe. Suoh's grave was empty. Which made sense, considering he's asleep in a hospital bed. 

Reisi has never believed in miracles. Even the phenomena surrounding the Dresden Slate could be explained when you understood the rules the Plate operated under. But he knows he killed Suoh in the snow over a year ago. 

But he also knows that this is exactly who he thinks it is. Because Suoh hadn't been this skinny since middle school. He had only hit a growth spurt when he turned thirteen, and had looked incredibly awkward while he was still too short for his wide shoulders. 

Underneath the beanie he had been wearing, his hair is the same vivid crimson Reisi remembers, and that's enough to erase even a whisper of doubt in his mind. He’s as tall as he ought to be, with the same broad shoulders, and incurable bad attitude. Suoh survived the impossible. 

"Happy to see me?"

Reisi tilts his head; Suoh is awake, but his eyes are still shut. There's something like a smirk on his face that only widens when he opens his eyes. 

"I do not think that 'happy' is the right word to describe my current state," he replies. 

Suoh snorts at that. 

"I didn't do it on purpose." 

"Oh?" 

Suoh turns his head to look at him, strands of crimson hair falling over his forehead. The look in his eyes makes Reisi think back to those middle school years, when Suoh only existed to get Reisi into trouble, and Reisi only existed to get Suoh out of it. He thinks of summers and watermelon slices, of winters and hot tea. He thinks of class trips, and of going off the beaten path because Suoh wanted to explore. 

He thinks of a first kiss at fourteen, hesitant but sure. Knowing that Suoh wouldn't push him away for trying. Of knowing what that meant, but not wanting to call it what it was for fear of making it disappear by naming it. He thinks of the dozens of other kisses that came after that, and then the empty years when high school separated them. He thinks of how they grew up and then apart. 

He thinks of becoming the Blue King, of Suoh becoming the red. He thinks of the way his childhood crush came back in full force the first time he saw Suoh in the field. He thinks of the way they fought always seriously, but how they pulled their punches when they came too close to hurting one another. He thinks of that shared hesitation. He thinks of the first time he stumbled into bed with the Red King, and the dozens of times they went at each other again after that. 

He thinks of the fact that a year ago, he killed the first person he ever loved, and how he wasn't even able to bury him. 

"This is your fault," Suoh says, gesturing vaguely at himself. 

Reisi furrows his brows. 

"My fault?"

"Blue tempers red," Suoh says, as if that's the answer to everything. 

"I put my sword through your chest."

"Yeah," Suoh says. "Hurt like a bitch."

 Reisi ignores the way his hands have taken on a fine tremor, and he also does his best not to roll his eyes at Suoh's vulgarity. 

"If red is chaos, blue is order," Suoh says. "If red is destruction, blue is creation."

Suoh brings his hands up onto his chest. Reisi watches as they rise and fall as he breathes. He notes the way his fingers are a healthy pink now instead of the angry red that denotes frostbite. His body temperature had been perilously low when he was first admitted, but as he slept, the temperature raised until he didn't seem like he was on the verge of dying of hypothermia. 

"What do you think happens," he says, "when creation impales destruction?"

Rebirth. 

It's silly. It's improbable. It's a story, it has to be. But Suoh is here, in front of him, looking thin and weak but also, so very like himself. Like he knows something Reisi doesn't. Smug. Whole. Alive. 

It was probably something to do with his former aura, the way the red HOMRA marks had fluttered into the air to aid the person who had placed them. They had healed the fatal wound and probably had mended his decimated Weismann level which had inadvertently altered his internal temperature, Reisi thinks, and had brought Suoh back to life. But dragging someone back from the dead was clearly an imperfect art if it meant Suoh's thin form and his apparent yearlong case of frostbite. 

"If anyone but you had done it, I probably wouldn't've come back," Suoh continues. "So this? Is your fault."

Suoh gives him what can only be described as a shit eating grin. Reisi runs the probability of it over and over again in his head, wondering how exactly it worked, how exactly it happened. Blue and red aren't opposite colors, they're complementary. And apparently, that made all the difference. 

It's enough and it isn't enough. He wants to understand it, but Suoh scoffs and rolls his eyes.

"Munakata," he drawls in that way of his. "I can hear you thinking."

There's shouting just loud enough to be heard from the hallway. Reisi tucks his glasses back further onto his nose, and ignores the way his throat suddenly feels scratchy, and the way that something suspiciously like tears are forming at the corners of his eyes. 

"And I can hear your clansmen harassing hospital personnel."

Suoh grunts at that, in a proud sort of way. Reisi gets up so that he can leave before the Red Clansmen arrive. It won't do for them to start throwing around accusations concerning what he's doing there with Suoh. And besides, this is a reunion a year in the making. Reisi can wait. 

As he turns to leave, he can feel Suoh's hand lash out to wrap around his wrist. Reisi looks down at where Suoh is holding him, and then up to Suoh's face. Even on his hard angled face, the look Suoh gives him is soft. Reisi hasn't seem him look this way since he died. 

"You owe me a drink, Munakata."

Reisi lifts one eyebrow. 

"For what?"

Suoh bares his teeth at him in a cocky smile.

"For killing me," he says. 

"If I recall," Reisi says, not twisting his wrist out of Suoh's grasp. "I did that as a favor to you."

Suoh rubs his thumb against Reisi's thundering pulse point. 

"Then I owe you one."

The yelling outside gets closer, and Reisi can hear thundering footsteps. It seems the whole clan has come to see if their wayward member is still alive. They'll likely get much louder when they realize who he actually is. 

Reisi can't fault them for falling for Suoh's inadvertent disguise. He covered his hair and wore a ridiculous amount of layers. He walked without his own typical swagger, with his shoulders hunched over. And he had given them a different name. It was only because Reisi had known the Mikoto who was gangly and who had poor posture that he recognized him in Kino Makoto.

"I'll take you up on that, then." 

Suoh's gaze softens, and Reisi carefully pulls himself out of his grasp before either of them can say or do anything ridiculous. He steps out of Suoh's hospital room right as the Red Clan begins to thunder in. The news had traveled fast; he had told Awashima only to contact Kusanagi. But the Reds always did treat each other like blood. How fitting. 

He doesn't need to see it when Yatagarasu weeps when he sees Suoh. And he doesn't see how Anna can suddenly recognize Suoh, because his memories are his own again. He doesn't need to see Kusanagi drag Suoh into a bone crushing embrace, because he thought that he lost him. He doesn't need to see it to know that the Red Clan is suddenly in celebration after a year of quiet mourning. 

He doesn't need to see to know. All Reisi can think of as he leaves, is Suoh's hand on his wrist, and Suoh's soft gaze, and the promise of a drink that will come when Suoh is released from the hospital. Quietly, he goes home, he eats dinner, he takes a bath, and he gets into his bed. In the darkness of the middle evening, Reisi stares at his hands, and then up at the ceiling above him.

He didn't kill Suoh. He saved him. 

* * *

His body will never be able to take on an aura. He will never be able to lead a clan as a King. He might be a Strain now, because he's wicked fast, but he's not as strong as he used to be and he'll never be the same as he was before. Mikoto doesn't give a shit. 

A second chance is enough. He isn't going to waste it.

**Author's Note:**

> yeah i finished season one of K yesterday and did not handle it well as you can very obviously tell from this wish fulfillment
> 
> the drink makoto/mikoto makes for yata is a tequila sunrise, and the one he makes for anna is a shirley temple, a non-alcoholic drink that's basically sprite and grenadine and they're RED because i thought it would be funny and i'm ridiculous
> 
> comments are food for starving artists xx thank you for reading!


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